Spare Change
by KissTheBoy7
Summary: A depiction of the insecurity of a certain troubled teenager and the bond she shares with her best friend. April/Mimi friendship. Maybe a hint of unrequited femmeslash if you squint? Oneshot.


**A/N: This one is dedicated to Vikki whenever she reads it, because she was there for me through one of the hardest times in my young life. Thanks for sticking around when no one else wanted me. Love you. :3 Oh, and uh, everyone else enjoy too.**

Disclaimer: _I no own RENT, just this little piece of teen!fluff. Awwweh. Lookit them._

**Spare Change**

Darkness should be scary, unknown- but to April, the blindness she suffered in the dark was more of a miracle than anything else. At least when she couldn't see she couldn't distract herself with all of those awful thoughts, the voices, the ones she was going to the shrink about tomorrow.

The ones that landed her in a hospital bed all hooked up to a thousand IVs.

It was early March and still chilly at three in the morning. April was tired; a mile was a long way to walk to find a pay phone in the cold, but she couldn't risk getting caught calling anyone at this hour. Better for her father to assume she was out whoring herself for drug money again than to hear this conversation.

Feet aching and short, choppy red hair sticking to her head in the thick mist, April kept on down the sidewalk resolutely. God, this had better be worth it…

A handful of coins were warm in her palm, tucked into her pocket in an attempt to keep her fingers from freezing before she could punch in the numbers. She shouldn't be out in the city this late at night, alone, easy prey- but she'd seen things and she'd done things and she trusted herself.

Herself. Not her luck. Her luck was shit.

It was a few unbearably chilly minutes before April found the payphone, glass cracked and dirty, and stepped into it. She licked her lips nervously and fumbled with the coins, inserting them with pale, shaky fingers. It was all she could do to keep the tears at bay. April prided herself on being numb, on being able to school her expression and just suck it up no matter how much it hurt, and she hated the times like these when the pressure cracked the dam she'd built, threatening to implode her skull.

But everything could still be okay, she reminded herself. Mimi was going to be there for her, just like she always was. Like she'd sworn to God that she always would be.

Of all of the people who had made that promise to her, she was the only one who'd meant it.

Once she'd managed to punch the correct numbers she shifted from foot to foot as she listened to the tinny ringing, trying not to let her mouth too close to the cool metal or risk catching some kind of herpes. (She'd had quite enough brushes with that particular disease, as well as all of the others.) _Come on… Come on…_ She clung to the phone like it was the only thing in the world, shivering violently in a way that had nothing to do with the cold.

Ring… Ring… The orange streetlights were starting to get to her, the lack of sound making her paranoid, spinning around and around getting the cord wrapped around her as she tried to keep a lookout in every direction at once, fear and anxiety clouding her mind. She was dangerously close to a panic attack, _right_ there and then-

"Hello? Who the fuck is it? It's three a.m. you asshole, you can't just-"

"Meems?" Her voice had never sounded so weak, like a lost little girl, and she barely had time to be disgusted with herself before Mimi was responding.

"April?" Alarmed, her voice sharpened with concern, slightly louder now. "Where are you? This isn't your number. Are you hurt? Did you relapse? Did you run awa-"

"I- I'm fine," she stammered, shivering violently again and not daring to focus on any one object in the darkness lest she scare herself again. Shadows were all too easily turned to frightening beasts and murderers and- and rapists in her mind's eye. "I'm fine…"

"Chica, it's _three a.m._" April could practically hear her friend rolling her eyes and fought back a tearful smile. Mimi always made her smile; it was exactly why she had come all the way out here to talk to her. "What's on your mind?"

Here was the hard part. Why had she called, if she didn't want to explain herself? Why did she bother when even she couldn't pinpoint the exact reason she was so upset? She didn't feel right, but everyone had bad days. She was nothing special, just another depressed teenager doing stupid shit on a weeknight when she wasn't supposed to be out. There was a long pause before she finally whispered into the phone, "I'm just nervous."

In her mind she could see the transformation coming over her friend's caramel face, a glow of understanding. "Oh, no. Is this about your appointment?"

"Course it is." She barked a short laugh, already getting that sinking feeling in her chest. _You've made a mistake, you've done something stupid- why can't you just suck it up and deal with it on your own?_ The voice, not hers, haunted her day and night.

It was the same voice, she remembered with a shudder, that had told her to bring the blade to her wrist that first time and who told her _"deeper"_ the last.

Mimi gave it a moment and then, even more softly, asked, "Are you going to tell them this time? Everything?"

The redhead's knuckles turned white around the phone, swallowing thickly. She wondered, briefly, when this girl had come to know her so well. The very thought of telling anyone about the voices in her head made her squirm but somehow Mimi had understood when she managed to stammer it out, hugged her even, told her that she didn't think of her any differently. It was, if possible, even harder to force anymore words out of her throat.

"I- I don't know. I should. Right? I should…" she trailed off uncertainly, twisting a strand of hair around her finger to ward off her anxiety. Every time Mimi paused to gather her thoughts she faced a sudden and rather irrational wave of panic- _what if she's hung up, what if she doesn't want to deal with me anymore, what if she didn't care all along-_ and fought to keep silent, waiting as patiently as physically possible.

"I want you to promise me you will," Mimi finally murmured, sighing quietly through the phone. April felt a tear trail down her pale face and didn't bother wiping it away, nodding even though the other girl couldn't see her.

"I- I will. If you want me to." Always anxious to please, always waiting on everybody else. April sometimes wondered how she had spiraled so out of control in the past year. _So unlike her_, she heard the family whisper behind her back as she passed. _So unexpected. She's off her head, that one- should have seen it coming with parents like hers._

Not to say that she had the worst parents in the world, but she definitely didn't have the best.

"I want you to do it for you, not me- but if you'll do it for me then I guess that works, too." Mimi's smile transcended all of the distance between them, made April smile weakly in return and hope that her friend could feel it. Humor laced her tone, and there was nothing in the world that April appreciated more.

"… I guess-" Belatedly realizing how inconsiderate she was probably coming off, she sheepishly replied, "I'm sorry I woke you up…"

"It's no problem, chica. When has it ever been a problem? _Really_," the Latina laughed. That laugh always did strange things to April's heart.

"Love you," she whispered, relief rolling off of her in waves. There was hushed smacking sound and a whoosh, and she realized that Mimi had blown a kiss through the phone.

Suddenly, it didn't seem quite so dark anymore.

"Love you too, chica." A pause. "…I'll catch a bus up there tomorrow and we can talk about it, okay?"

"Okay…" She bit her lip, gut coiling again. Had Mimi gotten sick of her already? Of course she hadn't protested to being woken up. She was too nice for that. April should have-

"Do you still need me?"

Caught off guard, she babbled, "Wh-what? No. No I- I'm fine, I should really let you sleep…"

"Pshh… Sleep , or you. Which one do you think is going to win?"

"You need your beauty sleep, don't you?" she countered, beginning to warm up to Mimi's natural optimism. It was ever so helpful in situations like these.

"_Me? _Please, honey, you ought to go to bed yourself," she giggled. "Well… If you don't need me- I should get off the phone before mom has a cow. Good night?"

"Good night," she confirmed.

As she hung up, April squared her shoulders, unable to stop smiling.

It may be a long few hours before her appointment and a mile to home, but her heart was light. This had been so worth the walk, the cold, her lunch money for the next day. Mimi. She was always worth it. She was the only one in the world who understood, or tried. The distance that April had so dreaded when she first moved to the suburbs barely even affected her now.

All it took to reach her was a couple of quarters.


End file.
